


Bewitched

by pastelaws



Category: Waterparks (Band)
Genre: First Person, Halloween, M/M, read it dude it has Jet in it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-19
Updated: 2018-11-09
Packaged: 2019-08-04 12:13:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16346537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pastelaws/pseuds/pastelaws
Summary: It was an in between season. In between rain and snow. In between hot and cold. It was like me. In between. In between adulthood and childhood. In between straight and gay.Halloween Gawsten AU.





	1. A Scaredy Cat

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is actually a collab with a writer on Wattpad named -Soyy-Boyy- so thanks to them for pitching the idea of a Halloween collab fic. This is going to be a ten chapter first person fic. If you're interested in seeing this story told from Geoff's point of view, you can check that out on their story on Wattpad. If you prefer reading on there, I'll also have their story up over there too. My username is the same on both sites.

Some people would say that I was a bit of an autumn fanatic. I loved the smells. The warm apple pie my mom would make with enough cinnamon to make the entire house smell like pie for a week. The pumpkin spice lattes my friends and I would drink every Thursday after school from Starbucks while we bothered our friend Travis at work. The scent of the pumpkin that used to linger in the house when we were younger whenever Gracie and I would carve pumpkins; she was always better at it than I was even though she was younger than me.

I loved the feeling. The cool fall weather blowing against the space between my pants and shirt that rode up when I'd put my arms up. The fuzzy feeling of the socks my mom insisted on getting me every Christmas and despite my original protests, that I always would end up wearing. The warmth that would sting your skin every time you came in from the cold.

I loved a time when the summer would come to an end but before the snow would coat the ground and cause everyone to start shopping. It was an in between season. In between rain and snow. In between hot and cold. It was like me. In between. In between adulthood and childhood. In between straight and gay. It was something I looked forward to every year. I found a strange comfort whenever the leaves would leave their homes. It gave me the hope that maybe one day I would leave mine too.

It wasn't that Houston was all that horrible but it wasn't meant for someone like me. Life wasn't easy when your eyes were two different colors; blue that rivaled the tides and green like the color of a Christmas tree. It got to a point where I was so used to the people in my town talking down to me about my appearance that I got my friend Jawn to dye my hair blue. That was a few months ago, so you'd think people would've been over it but they weren't. Houston wasn't horrible but the planet was huge and I had too many places to peek at to stay in an area I had already spent the last sixteen years of my life in.

I wasn't leaving Houston anytime soon unfortunately. I wasn't even leaving my neighborhood. I was going to a Halloween party on the other side of Cypress, which is about as middle class as you can get in Houston. My parents were the definition of average. They were high school sweethearts that went to different colleges and reconnected during their senior year when they were both home for Christmas. They ended up graduating and getting married. They even got their little suburban paradise with a white picket fence. A couple years later, I happened. I was the best thing to come out of them ever meeting but Gracie would argue that position was taken by her. She happened five years later. I'd never admit it out loud but they give me hope that true love exists. Hell, dad still takes her out on dates every Friday and brings her home flowers every now and again.

It was only natural that with my love of the fall came an obsession with Halloween. Not only was it the only holiday that included free candy but it featured spooky decorations. Maybe it was the fact I was one of the only vaguely alternative people in my school that I loved it so much. That's what my friend Grace always told me anyways. She was one of the other people that got odd looks every now and again because of her dyed hair. I dyed it pink a couple of weeks ago and she's been getting more attention than ever, which when you're a girl like Grace, is always a positive.

I wasn't exactly thrilled to be going to a Halloween party. I was sort of hoping to skip the event and take Gracie trick-or-treating. Taking Gracie trick-or-treating allowed me to also cash in on the free candy being given out by our neighbors instead of just sorting through her discarded chocolate like mom and dad did. It didn't matter how much I tried to argue with Jawn, I wasn't getting out of going to the party. He even went as far to say that I was one of his selling points for his party.

That was something I never really understood. At school, it felt like everyone wanted to be my friend and get to know me. The only difference between me and the majority of my classmates -despite my eyes and hair- was that I played for our school's football team. It wasn't even like I was the quarterback or anything, I was the running back. Nobody seemed to care. They had this notion in their mind that all football players were somehow cool. Grace had the same experience as a cheerleader. Maybe if we looked how we did and weren't in the upper echelon of our high school, maybe we would be one of those people taking their kid sister trick-or-treating. That was the type of person I wanted to be.

Instead of being that person, I was now stuck in Jawn Rocha's living room trying to keep my sleeves out of his obviously spiked punch bowl. I wanted some of whatever the dark purple drink was but the black flowing sleeves of my costume seemed to cause a bit more of an issue than I originally thought. I sort of assumed Jet would be the hardest part of my costume to keep in tact. I hadn't exactly told my mom I took her with me after all.

I had tried to convince her a couple days before the party because really, what kind of witch would I be without my cat? Don't answer that. My mom didn't. She just argued that a high school party wasn't exactly the best place for Jet to be on Halloween, mumbling something about people not being the nicest to black cats on that day for some reason. She was wrong. When we first got here, Jet left me for a pack of stoners who were petting her like they had never touched a cat before.

Even if my mom was right, I didn't exactly feel the safest in a social setting without my emotional support animal. That's probably why after Jet got a suitable amount of pets from the kids in my gym class, she came back to me. She's got an interesting way to get my attention that consists mostly of the cutest meow in the world and a series of headbutts to my shin. I don't mind though. 

She's the cutest cat in the world, which is saying something because I'm a dog person. We probably would've gotten a dog for my emotional support animal but Gracie got bit as a kid by the neighbor's German Shepard and has been scared of them ever since. I got bit a couple years back by a dog too but I still love them. I don't love cats really, I just love my cat. I loved my cat more than my costume at the moment.

After struggling for another minute or so, I somehow convinced the host of the party to get me a glass. His eyes lit up when I asked and he got up immediately. Jawn was a nice enough guy, we just didn't have a lot of classes together. We met back in our freshman year when we both ended up in the same math class. Turns out he's just as bad with numbers as I am. Go figure.

“Cool costume.” Jawn commented, gesturing to my outfit. My mom was one of those stay at home moms with way too much time on her hands and a love on Pinterest. She'd been making our Halloween costumes since I was born so when I told her I wanted to be a witch, she got to work on making something incredible and just as extra as I am. “Not many people could pull it off but you make it work.”

Jawn didn't need to explain himself. His comment was pretty obvious considering I was in a glitter invested to the knee dress with tall black boots. I took them from my mother's closet. She always had the highest heels in the back of her closet. I think before she had me, she might've been a stripper. Another secret, don't tell. Obnoxious outfits weren't really out of character for me. I had a feeling it would've been more of a problem if I wasn't in shape and could kick the ass of anyone within a mile. My biceps let me get away with wearing bralettes and I was fine with that.

“Thanks.” I was starting to think everyone at this school really did think I was Regina George or something. It was like I could wear a pair of booty shorts to school and suddenly the next day, everyone would be wearing booty shorts. Which is something that actually happened. It reminded me of a book my mom used to read to me as a kid about a girl and her ponytail. My eyes glanced at the red head's outfit from the floor to the ceiling. “Charmander, right?”

“Yeah!” Jawn did a small twirl, trying to show off the back of his tail. I would've told him it was incredible if I didn't hear the sound of shear horror: my cat screaming. My usual little bundle of joy was letting out a sound that made me want to shove Jawn into the punch I didn't even get to taste yet. He had accidentally stepped on Jet's tail. “Fuck!” Jet moved faster than I had ever seen her go, snaking through the crowd in hopes to find somewhere safe from the fire breathing lizard.

“Jet!” I didn't have time for Jawn or anyone that was probably looking at me snaking through the crowd. I heard someone I could only assume as Jawn shout sorry but I didn't have time to tell him it was okay. I needed to find her and make sure she was okay. If she wasn't at home and in one piece with me when the clock struck midnight, my mom would be grounding me until Christmas.

After I made my way through the living room and learned that the front door was thankfully shut, I calmed down a little. Jet had to be somewhere inside this house. Given the way she made her escape, the only logically place was to go up. I walked passed two kids I recognized from my AP History class making out on the stairs. If I was in a better mood, I probably would've joked about them getting a room or something.

When I got to the top of the stairs, I was sort of expecting to find my babygirl at the end of the hallway. She wasn't, of course. That would've made my life fair too easy. There were instead six doors I had to choose from. Four opened slightly and two closed completely. I recognized one instantly as a bathroom based on a three person line that had formed. I thought about asking one of them if they had seen a small creature as dark as a shadow run past them but figured I could find her on my own.

With the sound of sex coming from one of the two concealed rooms, I opened the first door and found nothing but towels. The second held a situation that would probably require a towel for some clean up. I had no desire to see Patty Walter's ass. It was another thing in a long list of things to repress. The third door had a girl I recognized from my English class puking her guts all over someone's bed. If I had known her a little better, I would've held her hair back or something.

When I came to the fourth door, I expected to see my cat on the other side of it so it came as no surprise to me that when I opened it, I did. It just wasn't the reunion I thought it would be. When Jet usually got scared and ran off, she would wait for me to find her and come headbutt my leg again. Instead of doing that, she was looking at me with her gorgeous green eyes while a boy dressed all in a similar green sat on the end of a bed, petting her head. Seeing me didn't cause her any relief, she was already getting that relaxation from someone else. She was mocking me.


	2. Hang Around For A Spell

I wanted to hiss the word traitor but it didn't come out fast enough. My cat was in the arms of a boy that wasn't me. If I was being honest, it hurt about the same when I found my girlfriend in the arms of another guy on the football team. The only difference was I expected something like that from Ciara. Jet was a different story.

Jet was what you would call a one person cat, at least according to my mom. From the day we got her, she was always by my side. From morning to night, she'd be hanging out with me. Anytime I was home and she was awake that is. I always sorta chalked it up to her being my support animal but that idea went out the window when she scratched my dad when he tried to pick her up. She was a bit picky about people touching her even if she did love all the attention.

"Is that your owner?" The voice interrupted my train of thought even if it wasn't directed to me. I had no idea who the person in front of me was and that was saying something. I had a vague idea of absolutely everybody in our school. Even if I didn't know their names, I knew their faces. For some reason, I was drawing a blank on this person. It wasn't even like he was wearing a mask or anything. "Go on. You should say hi to them. They were probably worried sick about you."

His eyes weren't looking at me anymore but I remembered them clearly. They reminded me of the ocean, a place I had never been but wanted to visit. I had seen pictures but not the real thing. His eyes are what made all the gears in my head click into place. Geoff Wigington. Senior. I was so captivated by the color of his eyes, I almost didn't notice my cat headbutting his leg.

"She wants you to pick her up." His gaze returned to mine and once I got a look at those eyes again, it didn't matter what stupid green thing he was supposed to be. He was cute, I decided. Even if his brown hair was a bit too long for my usual taste. Geoff's face wore a single expression; confusion. The cute meow that came out of Jet was usually for me but this time it was for someone else.

"I, uh." He looked embarrassed almost. Kind of flustered. It was cute, really. The way he brushed his hair back from his face -wait, was that a nose ring?- before trying again. "I don't know how to hold a cat." I blinked once and then twice, assuming this is some sort of really unfunny joke instead of just a confession of him having a tragic life. I took a couple steps towards the two of them, Jet not giving me the time of day. She's more shallow than I gave her credit for.

"You like pick her up with two hands." I picked up Jet carefully, putting my hands under her back paws and rested her upper torso on my chest. When I was younger, I used to grab cats by the stomach. They always used to scratch me. Come to think of it, that's probably why I didn't like cats. I just remembered them always being huge assholes to me. "You put one hand under her back paws and I kinda just put the rest of her on my chest. You can put your other hand under her front paws though."

"She looks like a baby when you hold her like that." He commented with a chuckle even though it wasn't actually funny. Jet was probably the closest thing I'd ever have to a baby. I wasn't responsible enough to take care of myself, let alone another person. My cat, on the other hand, was pretty self sufficient as far as pets go. As long as I remembered to top up her water and food every now and then, she was good.

"She's a big baby." I tried my best to set her back carefully down from where I got her; at Geoff's feet. He was wearing brown boots with his interesting outfit. I was still in the process of trying to figure out what he was supposed to be. He was wearing mostly green with a floppy sort of hat on his head. Beside him was a metallic looking sword and shield. It was useless. "Try and pick her up now. You can like put her on your lap or whatever."

He didn't respond at first, not verbally. He just leaned forward and scooped Jet up into his arms. He eventually guided the black cat into his lap. I realized that I probably should've warned him about the obvious problem at hand. Cat hair. Whatever. He could deal with the lonely people glitter I wore every day. It wouldn't kill him for a night.

Geoff was petting her under her chin now. That was one of her sweet spots. She started purring for him a couple seconds later, causing Geoff to look up at me with a horrified expression. Had he really never heard a cat purr before? Now he was just fucking with me.

"I think I broke your cat." I couldn't tell if he was joking or not. There was a smile on his face but there was a hint of nervousness to it. Either way, it was a nice smile. It made me feel like all of my problems could melt away if I looked at it for long enough.

"Nah. It means she likes you." Any nervousness he once had faded away. He was grinning ear to ear at this point, as if you had just told him he had won the lottery. It didn't matter that there was a couple having sex next door or that there was a cheesy pop song blasting through the walls of the house. In that moment, I was glad I had come to Jawn's stupid party.

"Really?" Excitement filled his voice and it made me wonder if he had ever actually met a cat in his entire life. He had moved on to petting Jet's back but her purring remained all the same. There was a weird feeling in my chest that I couldn't identify. Was this what people called jealousy? I wasn't sure. Her emerald eyes shot me a look that made me question if all of this was intentional.

"Never heard of purring before?" The brown haired boy sniffled, eye remaining on the cat in his lap. Was he holding back tears? Don't get me wrong, Jet was incredible, but tears? That would've been a new one, even for me.

"Not in person. Never pet a cat before." His reactions suddenly made more sense. Despite the fact Geoff had never handled a cat before, he seemed to be doing a pretty good job. Jet seemed more happy than usual, purring up a storm. Every now and then she would open up her bright eyes and make sure I was still close by and doing okay. I think she might've felt guilty about leaving me alone before.

"What? Why?" I petted under her chin, silently hoping she knew that it was okay. Well it wasn't okay okay, you know? It wasn't cool of her to just ditch her job like that and yeah, I was kind of an anxious mess without her, but like I forgive her. If somebody like twenty times my size stepped on me, I'd probably scream bloody murder and run as far away from them as possible too.

"Allergic." Oh. That made a lot more sense why his eyes were watering. Duh. His sniffling too, now that I thought about it. I kind of felt bad for the kid. Could you imagine being allergic to something that that adorable? I would die. I felt more bad about the fact that he would be covered in cat hair and sneezing all night. "What's her name? She's beautiful."

"Jet." She locked eyes with me again, loving the attention she was getting from Geoff. It felt like she was trying to make me jealous or something. A part of me did feel that way but I felt more happy about the situation then I did a couple minutes before. Geoff had this look of adoration on his face. There was no way he could've loved my cat anymore than I did but he clearly was a fan of her silky black fur.

"Weird name for a cat." He was right. In the sixteen years of my life, I had never really met another pet named Jet, let alone a cat. Thinking back to the day I got her, it made sense. She had sped around the house at top speeds. Gracie and I joked that it was like she was wearing a jetpack or something. Her name stuck almost immediately. As time passed, she started to slow down though. I wasn't sure if it was just her getting older or if she knew I couldn't keep up with her, especially in these shoes. My feet were killing me.

"Weird names are a trademark for my family." There was no way Geoff didn't know about the odd spelling of my first name. It was the talk of the school when I had first started as a freshman. Nobody could actually believe that I had a name spelt so ridiculously. Gracie got a more normal name as far as spellings go but she had never met another Gracie either. We bonded over the hatred of our names at a young age like all kids did; over not finding our names on pencils, keychains and mugs. We thought our parents must've hated us.

"I wish I had an interesting name." He wasn't looking at me and hadn't been for a while. It was a shame, really, he had incredible eyes. They were probably one of his best features, not that I was looking. Okay, I might've been looking a little but that stays between us. "My family is like the definition of average. Geoff, Sarah and Rebecca."

"Parents still together?" I asked more so out of curiosity but it helped that I had a joke about divorce lined up in my back pocket. It was 2018. Nobody's parents were actually together anymore. Nobody but mine, anyways. Most of my classmates either had recently single parents or parents who had remarried. The brown haired boy let out a loud sneeze. I was surprised Jet didn't go running like she did whenever my dad would sneeze. "Bless you."

"Sort of." I didn't want to press on the situation. "Thanks." Instead, I focused on his smile. He still wasn't facing me entirely, still sniffling. It didn't matter that I couldn't see the majority of his smile hidden behind his sand colored hair, it was still one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. I vowed to be on the receiving end of another one of those but next time be able to fully appreciate it. "Church every Sunday but I'm not religious." I suddenly felt self conscious of the golden cross around my next. It didn't mean much to me but I still wore it every day.

"Me ei-" It didn't matter what I was going to say. The creek of the door opening snapped us out of whatever alternate reality we were in.

In the low-light of the bedroom, I noticed an orange lizard tangled in the arms of someone dressed as Robin Hood. They were in a deep make out session. Geoff and I looked at each other, silently plotting our escape. They hadn't seen us just yet and maybe that was for the best. It would've been a great time for us to leave but unfortunately, Jawn felt the need to open his eyes. He tore himself off the other person faster than I had ever seen him move before. His mouth hung open, probably with questions on his tongue but nothing coming out. He wasn't the only one with questions.

"Do you have any allergy medication?" Jawn quirked one of his dark brows at me. It was something I had been thinking of since he mentioned his reaction to my cat. I felt awful that his eyes were watering like we were watching The Notebook. His sneezing didn't make me feel any better either. I was so paranoid that Jet would get freaked out and run to yet another part of the party, putting me in yet another awkward situation.

"Achoo!" This sneeze was louder than the previous and I was positive that my little angel would get spooky and flee from the boy dressed in green. To my disbelief, she didn't. Jawn sighed, flashing an apologetic look to the Robin Hood he had clearly been interested in. I felt a little bad about cockblocking him but I was also a little more worried about the state of Geoff's nose.

"Allergy medication." His brown eyes looked me up from head to toe. If I didn't know better, I would've thought he was checking me out. Jawn's eyes shot towards Geoff, looking over his body quickly. Why was he looking at us like he had walked in on us? I'm pretty sure he was just the one about to get laid. Jet was in the room and I'm not about to corrupt my baby like that. Not that I was even thinking about fucking Geoff. At all. "Yeah. I think I've got some."


	3. Something Wicked This Way Comes

“Are you even listening?” To be fair, I wasn’t. I was so caught up in my own daydream that I wasn’t listening to a word Grace was saying. Instead, I was thinking back to a couple nights before. Jawn’s Halloween party wasn’t entirely the mess that I thought it would have been. I got an interesting interaction with an individual I never paid much attention to. Unfortunately, since that night I had been paying him more attention than anyone should have.

“Oh my god.” I could hear Grace’s voice but my eyes didn’t see her. I was too wrapped up in reliving the moment I met Geoff in my mind mixed with a couple of alterations. I wished I was nicer to the guy but it wasn’t my fault that things came out harder than I intended. I had lurked his Instagram account to apologize for it in my own silent way. What? He was cute. It’s not even like I requested it or anything.

“You’re not even listening.” Whatever Grace was talking about couldn’t have been more important than the boy with ocean eyes. There was a picture on his Instagram that stuck out in my mind the most. He was wearing a stripped shirt and smiling but the light hit his eyes and his nose ring in a way that made my legs turn into limp spaghetti. Geoff Wigington was positively breathtaking, even if he was sort of a nobody. I was surprised nobody else noticed.

“I’m sorry.” I told her and if I was being honest, I did kind of mean it. Grace was one of the only people I felt like I could actually be myself around. She made me feel normal instead of unique or special. Some kinds got told that they were smart as kids and would amount to great things and I wasn’t one of them. Instead, I was something much worse. I was told that I was good at football.

“What did you say?” The second I was told that, nothing else mattered. Teachers would give me passes on projects that I didn’t deserve and the universe started treating me different all because I could throw a ball and run pretty fast. Sometimes I wished that something bad would happen to me and I wouldn’t ever be able to play again. Then I could start being Awsten Knight and stop being Awsten Knight, sports superstar.

“I was telling you about the new routine and how I got yelled at for being too heavy.” I didn’t know much about cheerleading before I met Grace but talking to her really opened by eyes about how intense and competitive it could be. Grace was something called a flyer, which I learned was usually reserved for tiny girls who could be easily lifted. They were the girls that you saw being thrown and caught by the other members of the squad. I also learned that apparently you could lose that spot if you stopped being one of the lighter people.

“McDougall is an asshole.” Her coach was probably one of the most cutthroat people I had ever met. She rivalled being as tough as my coach, Merrick. McDougall was always on Grace to remain as light as possible which wasn’t as easy for girls as you’d think. Grace would often start skipping lunch in hopes of regulating her weight. It always worked and she only did it until she was back down to her normal weight but it still made me worry. She was small enough as is.

“You’re right.” She sighed loudly, which was something she did way more often than she should. “I’m just scared of being cut.” Being cut was a conversation the two of us had a lot. Being on our teams respectively protected us from the hectic hallways of our high school. We saw how the way people on our teams treated the people around us and had no intention of ever being on the other side of it. 

“I know but you won’t be. You’re one of the best flyers they’ve got.” Grace was more scared of being cut from her squad than I was. I think it was because the girls were a lot worse than the boys about that sort of stuff. A sick part of me actually wanted to be cut from the team. I would’ve loved to sit in the bleachers with people who didn’t play the sport and be able to talk about whatever was popular on Netflix.

“I’m just worried about losing all my friends.” Grace was confessing something that I thought about pretty often. I knew that if I wasn’t on the team anymore, the majority of the people I viewed as friends would leave me for dead. We weren’t friends so much as teammates meets acquaintances. Grace was one of the few people I think that would still talk to me if I left but I never told her it was something I thought about.

“No matter what, you aren’t going to lose me.” Grace was the first girl I met that treated me like a person instead of a prize. People wanted to be friends with me or date me but I don’t think anyone ever wanted to know me. Everyone always wanted something from me. It didn’t matter who I was on the inside. They liked the idea of who I was supposed to be way better.

“Have I told you that you’re like, my best friend?” Grace smiled at me for the first time in a long time. She smiled a lot but you could tell something was always off. There was never any warmth behind it. It never quite felt real. It was almost robotic at how forced it was. Every so often, the robot part of her would snap and a genuine emotion would escape. Those are the moments I lived for. Those were times she felt like she could be herself. They never lasted too long.

“Not lately.” I smirked at her but we both knew I was kidding. We were close enough that the majority of the school thought we were dating. It was something we tried back during our freshman year but we quickly realized that we made better friends than partners and parted ways. “You’re not the only one who’s stressed out. The game’s tonight.” I didn’t tell her I was worried, she already knew. I was before every game, convinced I would be the reason we lost. It didn’t happen often but it played in my mind whenever we did. It made me want to pull the plug on my brain.

“You’re going to be great. You always are Aws.” That was a name she had taken to calling me when we first started dating and it never really wore off. It was an exclusive name that only the people close to me could use. She was one of the only people outside of my family to use it on me. Every now and then, some idiot would try and use it to the same effect. It wasn’t that I didn’t like it more so as it was something exclusive and to be earned. It was a badge of closeness and familiarity that not everyone was allowed to wear.

“Hey Aws!” And that would be one of those idiots. Jawn Rocha was a cool enough guy but we weren’t exactly on terms I would deem good enough for him to be calling me that. Before I could turn around, his red hair appeared in front of me. Today, it was tucked into a man bun, showing off his dark roots. Jawn was another nobody that appeared to be slept on in the looks department.

“Hi.” Grace responded before I did, putting her robotic smile back on. It was all a formality. Grace was typically the type of person to flirt with everyone. After an interesting experience with Jawn’s current girlfriend Daphne, she backed off almost completely. She didn’t have an attraction to Jawn in the slightest although I did during our sophomore year. I never mentioned it to him and a couple months later, he started dating Daphne. I got over it faster than I thought I would’ve.

“What’s up?” It was out of character for Jawn to talk to me outside of class. We messaged back and forth on twitter every now and again but face to face interactions were few and far between. I tried my best to fight the urge to try and look for his blue eyed friend with little luck. I craned my head around as casually as possible but Geoff was nowhere in sight. If Jawn noticed, he said nothing about it.

“I just wanted to wish you luck on the game today.” He was grinning ear to ear which was something I saw a lot from him. His smile was one of the reasons I liked him so much in the first place. That tied with the fact that he could take amazing photos. He often asked me to be his model for his photography assignments and I would always accept. He made me look beautiful, which was something I wasn’t. “Both of you, I mean. I know your routine is going to be killer.” He smiled at Grace and she kept her almost animatronic smile locked onto him.

“Thanks!” I could tell she wasn’t sure what to say or do in the situation. His girlfriend was very much the jealous type. It didn’t make a ton of sense to me though because she was absolutely stunning, not that Grace wasn’t or anything. A ton of people at our school were attractive enough to be on billboards but we only had a handful of people who were actually influencers. If you could even call them that. I always thought you had to have over fifty thousand followers to even qualify for the title.

“Thank you dude.” Once I said the words, I knew I meant them even if I didn’t think I would have. Sometimes having support from people, even strangers, comforts people. It makes them feel better about everything that’s swirling around inside of their head. I don’t know if that’s always everyone’s intention but it always seemed to clear my head.

“I’m finally dragging Geoff to a game. He’s never been.” Jawn said the fact like I was supposed to be surprised by it but I wasn’t in the slightest. Geoff wasn’t the type of guy to do the whole sports thing. It made sense. It didn’t stop my heart from beating a little bit faster at the mention of his name. I tried to hold myself back from thinking of what would happen if we got to speak to each other again. I was scared that if I thought of that, my heart would quite literally burst out of my chest. “He would’ve been here but he’s waiting in line for some video game.”

It was probably a good thing Geoff wasn’t with him that day. If he was, I think he would’ve been able to tell that my heart was racing. In that moment, he would have known I liked him. I didn’t know it then but Geoff was good at reading people. Especially me.


End file.
